A .669 OPS isn’t great. It does put him about right in the middle though offensively. Which is fine. A league average bat, and arguably one of the best gloves in the league is an asset.

Can you project a full season worth of stats off the end of the season prior? Absolutely not, but what it shows is that the bat is still there.

Barmes was never an above average hitter. He has never had an OPS+ 100 or more. It’s probably a fallacy to think his bat will ever be anything special. Outside of a career year the best case scenario is probably a .245 hitter with tenish homers. Again. Nothing great. Probably overpaid. But there isn’t much else out there.

There is a reason it’s hard to get a really good shortstop. Because they don’t become available that often. When you have a good shortstop you tend to keep them. The Pirates continue to be in an uncomfortable position at short, but there aren’t a lot of way out of it.

So I’d keep Barmes next year. The internal options are pretty lacking outside of Jordy Mercer, who Clint Hurdle refuses to play regardless.

I know. He’s Hurdle’s blankie, he’s overpaid, he has no stick. If Mercer takes his job so be it. He can still play off the bench. He has some value though. He isn’t completely worthless like Rod Barajas
was.

I'm okay with depending on Barmes as the starting ss for Buccos for one more year. His bat will no doubt not be much, if any, better in 2013 and with his growing age, his fielding may go down a bit but he was certainly a very dependable glove at one of the most important defensive positions - I like him a whole lot more than Ronny Cedeno, that's for sure.